file processing question

[Axel Grune]

Hi, Im trying to read the data of a file with following method

file = open( inputfile, "r")
data = file.read()
file.close()

but 'data' is always smaller then the file size, e.g. I have a file 
which is 25677824 bytes but file.read() reads only 4295 (file.tell() = 
25677824).
Im using python 2.2 under win2k.

BTW,

file = open( inputfile, "r")
lines = file.readlines()
data = ''join( lines)
file.close()

has the same effect.

TIA,
Axel